The Start of the New Year

January has been fun but definitely less busy for us which has been a nice break from the chaos of the holidays. Since Aubrey has been stuck in the house most of the winter, we decided to start swim classes. She absolutely loves the water since most nights she asks us for a "tubby", so it is safe to say she has been really enjoying Saturday mornings swimming with Daddy. I think Daddy likes it just as much. Swim class is mostly singing songs and playing in the water, but they do put them under quite a few times. Aubrey is doing great and learing to kick her legs and float on her back.









We also went to a birthday party for my friend Kelly at her new house. Her boyfriend made us all homemade tacos and strawberry margaritas - so good. Later in the night he even surprised Kelly with a mariachi band playing in their living room. Aubrey and Max loved it and danced the whole time!









Some more fun pictures from January . . .







Playing with her birthday gift to Daddy.



Eating her favorite - yogurt.



Sleeping with her puppies.





Cheering on the Packers with Daddy.

Aubrey's New Room

This past month Dominic has been working on making Aubrey a big girl room. She will be moving into what was our guest bedroom so the new baby can move into the nursery. We chose purple for her room and Dominic painted all the trim and the closet doors white - it looks great! He also painted my bed from college white so she could have a big full size bed. I did the decorating but Dominic did all the work - it turned out fantastic. Aubrey loves her new room and spends tons of time each day playing in her room or just lying in the big bed. We are so excited that she loves it so much!

A Busy, Busy December

We have had a very busy month with lots of activities and getting together with family and friends for the holidays. It started out with going to lunch with Santa at the Milwaukee Zoo. Aubrey and Max loved all the singing and dancing to the Christmas songs but did not want to sit on Santa's lap. Here was our compromise.









We even tried for Aubrey to sit on Santa's lap when Santa was actually our friend Adam, but she wasn't buying it. This is as close as she got with daddy.





Our Christmas week was pretty hectic as well. We celebrated with lots of family and Aubrey loved opening all the presents. She said "ooh" to everything she opened and was so much fun to watch. From Santa she got a new kitchen and a Dora tent - these are still sitting in our living room because she is playing with them so much.



For New Year's Eve we ate dinner at my parents house where my dad made lobster, crab legs, and steak - all very good. Max and Aubrey were having so much fun so they stayed at my parents house while we went to Paul and Cecily's for a get together. Here is Mya at midnight - she was awake!



In other news, I am now six months pregnant. It has been going by so fast and you definitely don't think about it as much with a toddler running around.



We also had big news on December 30th in that my brother and his wife Kathie had their little boy Lucas Robert Alba weighing 8 lbs 1 oz - we don't have small babies in this family. I will post pictures of him soon, but Erika has one on her blog. We can't wait to meet him!

This past year has gone by amazingly fast but we are looking foward to the next year and getting to meet our new baby. I am already anticipating Aubrey being a big helper. She even got a Dora Big sister doll from Erika to start practicing - she carries it everywhere!



Here are some of my other favorite pictures from December.